Paranoia, paranoia.

[Jamie Quinn]

MARCH 25TH 2018 

*SOME SKETCHY ASS ALLEY IN ATLANTIC CITY.* 

A scruffy looking guy that looks like a Jesse Pinkman cosplayer is shown standing in a random alley. Making sure that no one sees him, he leans against a brick wall, smoking a menthol. His demeanor goes from chilled to startled as he jumps when hearing sirens and seeing a cop car speeding down a street nearby.

“Where the hell is she..."

He says to himself as takes one last drag before flicking the cigarette on the ground and stomping it out. Getting impatient, the man reaches into his pocket to retrieve his phone.

“Do you have it?”

“SHIT!” He damn near jumps out of his skin and spins around to find Jamie walking out of the shadows.

“You can’t just be walking up on people like in a dark ass alley. Especially considering why you’re here.”

Jamie just rolls her eyes and holds out her hand. The guy reaches into his jacket pocket and pulls out a small, rolled up paper bag and hands it to her.

“It’s exactly what you asked for. Was able to get both. No serials. Even threw in a little bit of extra ammo, too.”

Jamie opens up the bag and starts to dig around, inspecting to make sure she got what she asked for. Once she had confirmation, she rolls the bag back up, reaches into her back pocket, and brings out a small wad of Bills.

“Pleasure doing business as always, Jay.”

She gives a small smile to him while handing off the money. Jay takes it, and flicks through the small stack just enough to know that it was all there. It obviously wasn’t the first time he sold something to her so he knows Jamie is good for the money. She waits for him to acknowledge that everything was all good with a simple nod before turning on her stiletto heel to head back toward the way she came from. The walk felt like an eternity before she turned the corner and walked up to 2016 Granite Crystal Metallic Dodge Charger that already had the engine running. After she gets in she takes the paper bag, leans over a sulking Adriana, and throws it into the glove compartment. Jamie leans back up in her seat and glances at Adriana who is just looking out her window with her arms crossed.

“I can’t believe you’re making me do this.”

Not having the energy to get into another argument, Jamie just lets out a sigh and puts the car in drive.

***************  

*LATER THAT NIGHT AT LA CASA DE LESBIANS* 

"It’s for your protection.”

“What protection?! You heard what he said. He’s not going to hurt me.”

“I don’t trust him.”

“...But you trust Dez??” She says with a hand on her hip almost like she was mocking Jamie by being the Sponge Bob meme. Jamie gives her a side eye. "You know it's different with Dez"

Adriana just shakes her head and safely stored more make up into a large treasure chest like make up case. They'd been fighting on and off about Adriana going to stay with her parents for a bit. Adriana knew that it was probably a good idea, but she didn't fucking care. She wanted to be by Jamie's side.

“Desmond came clean to me about what this whole deal was. There was a job that went wrong and someone important got killed.”

“Yeah, and it only took you and him getting beat to a bloody pulp, plus your life being in danger for him to finally tell you. Wow. What a great friend you have there, Jamie.”

Adriana emphasizes her point by snapping her make up case closed. Jamie's face was basically healed up since being accosted in the parking lot nearly a month before. As horrible as Dez looked, it wasn't too bad. He had a couple of bruised ribs, but the worst was a broken nose. He wants cold blooded revenge. Jamie was on board with it, but as always Adriana was her priority.

"Did you pack the gun that I gave you?"

"Yes, I packed the fucking gun!"

Adriana's voice cracks a little. She has a couple articles of clothing in her hand and just throws them into her luggage before plopping down on their bed. Her eyes are brimmed with tears, but you can tell she’s trying to keep herself from crying by tensing her jaw. At this point, Jamie did feel bad because had she be in Adriana’s position she wouldn’t want to leave either. Hell, it would take the National Guard to come into her house and haul her away.


“I know. I know how hard this is for you and it’s hard for me, too. It’s not going to be for long. Just a few weeks. Okay?”

Adriana is so upset that she couldn't even look Jamie in the face.

“I love you. But you have to go.”

****************

March 26, 2018 

8:35 A.M. 

*Starbucks* 

One of the things that Jamie didn’t anticipate, being away from Adriana for the first time in forever, was how hard it was going to be for her to actually sleep. She never got the hype about missing the feeling of someone in a bed until she actually settled down. She couldn't go bug Desmond since he was away in Ireland on family emergency. So she spent most of her night watching Netflix and then watching Thadd’s matches. It also didn't help that anytime she heard a noise, she was ready to reach into the night stand and to go investigate. Of course Her lack of sleep resulted in her finding herself at a Starbucks. While standing in line, she kind observes her surroundings. People were either chatting or typing away frantically.

Almost everybody.

She noticed in her peripheral vision, a hipster looking guy who looks to be in his early 20s near the corner of the shop staring towards her way and he wasn’t wasn’t being quite subtle about it. She pretends to be looking off in another direction, but still keeping her vision partly on him.

“And what would you like, M’am?”

“I’m just going to get a grande Iced Caramel Macchiato, please.”

"That will be $4.79"

She hands her card to cashier and sorta looks over at the man again. Dude was still staring. Jamie is what you’d considered to be confrontational. So it was very hard to immediately not walk up to the nerdy mouth breather and ask what the hell his problem was. Especially when she noticed him taking what looked like to be a picture of her and possibly texting someone. It didn’t take long before she heard her name being called for her drink.

“Jamie!”

Jamie was about to grab her drink, but sees the guy basically bolt out the front door. Completely forgetting the icy cold beverage, She follows him, ends up finding him behind the building trying to get on his bike, runs up, pulls him off, and slams him into the brick wall by the collar of his shirt.

“You got 5 seconds to start telling me who the fuck you’re workin fo-”

“PLEASE DON’T HURT ME. I’m just a fan, I swear! I’m sorry. I was just curious if it was really you, but then I heard the barista call your name.”

“You have no idea how bad your day was about to get just now.”


“My bad.” He brushes himself off. " I just got all excited. I cannot wait to see you against Thadd 2 Badd at Warzone!"

She's gotta get used to the fact that she has fans now. She mutters an apology and was about to go back to get her drink when she smelled something familiar. “ Hey...Wanna hit this?” The stranger holds up a freshly rolled and lit blunt. Normally, there would be no way in hell Jamie would smoke after some stranger. But she was tired, angry, and so paranoid that she almost just beat up a fan. “Why the fuck not?” She plucks it away, takes a long hit, holding the smoke in for as long as she could before releasing it into the air. Hipster boy looks quite impressed.

"I know you’re you’re a total badass and you’re probably not scared of anything, but you shouldn’t worry about your match with Thadd. He has a lot of backyard experience, but I know you’ve done your fair share of gnarly shit. Just not in a wrestling ring, anyway”

He takes a hit and offers her another. You're basic 'puff, puff, give' rotation.

“Thadd is skilled and talented, but that hip is going to hold him back. You can tell how much pain he was in when Stian was landing those kicks left and right to his leg and he was having issues putting weight on it . I know Stian isn’t that strong and I know I have strength to cause the same effect, if not worse and this time he won’t have Crosby there to lift him up when he can’t walk.”

"He's like....super athletic and strong though. Maybe too athletic."

“How much is his athletic ability is going to be a factor once I destroy his hip which isn’t as rehabilitated as people think? He wouldn’t have won those first two matches if Crosby wasn’t there. Maybe Carsyn too for that matter. That’s how bad it gets for him. I have the endurance that his hip is going to take away from him.”

He just nods in agreement.

"Also, This is his first singles match in The factory. Just the possibility of getting his first single win may be too much of a distraction for him considering how he feeds off of the crowd and getting a reaction. He's going want to put on the best fight possible and prove that his hip is just fine. He'll be willing to do whatever it takes to impress the crowd while trying to get a win, but being limited due to his hip will most likely deter his confidence OR...he may be stupid enough to try something and re-injure himself in the process. He hates that “real wrestling” bullshit just as much as I do. So the fact that it’s going to get crazy violent is pretty much a given. With the week I’ve been having, It's going to be unfortunate for him because I’m going to be using any and everything I can to take it out on him and his fucking hip.”

The dude nods his head and holds the blunt up to her again, but Jamie waves it off. She didn't think her day would end up like this. Sitting in an alley, smoking weed and talking to someone she didn't even know, but it felt nice to talk to someone who was not in her circle. It was sorta refreshing. They finish up the last of the blunt before the stranger without a name starts to get back on his bike.

"I gotta get going. You're a cool chick, Jamie. Scary, but fucking cool. You're gonna kick ass on Monday night."

He pedals away down the sidewalk. Jamie felt her phone vibrate in her back pocket. She pulls it out and sees a missed text from Desmond.

"Back in the states. Let's take this fucker down."

Jamie feels a tap on her shoulder. A Starbucks employee is holding up her Iced Macchiato.

"Ummm, M'am. Here's your drink..."